


Like Moths Around A Flame (…Onlookers Just As Guilty As I)

by Aoife



Series: 31 Days @ LJ: 2013 [20]
Category: Honor Harrington Series - David Weber
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Community: 31_days, Cultural Differences, Gen, Mythic Archetypes, Political Expediency, Reenactment of Myths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-07
Updated: 2013-05-07
Packaged: 2017-12-10 19:44:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/789459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoife/pseuds/Aoife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Oh Look, a new AU. Or a sequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/774019">This Is Political (It's Not Personal)</a>, anyway, which is definitely AU, so it needs a name.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Like Moths Around A Flame (…Onlookers Just As Guilty As I)

**Author's Note:**

> Oh Look, a new AU. Or a sequel to [This Is Political (It's Not Personal)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/774019), anyway, which is definitely AU, so it needs a name.

They gather around her like a cloud of near-moths to a flame. He knows this, because he is just another of those moths … perhaps a little more self-aware than most of them, dancing in the firelight and guarding it from those who would put it out, because he has no right to claim it as his own, despite his desire to. For _him_ to do so would mean the extinguishing of it far too early.

White Haven is one of those moths, and he hates the way the other man is fluttering around the Steadholder right now. It's not the fact that he is married; White Haven is _almost_ Grayson these days – if he, the Steadholder and _his senior wife_ came to an appropriate agreement, that would of course be their business – and he suspects that White Haven would very much like it to be _his_ business. He does wonder if White Haven has actually discussed this with his senior wife as a Grayson should though. Perhaps he could …? No, that wasn't his place - but if this went on too long, a quiet, circuitous message to Katherine Mayhew, might be a solution to all of this.

The other problem with the fact that White Haven is obviously interested in his Lady is that she flinches whenever White Haven steps within the range within which he knows she can't help but feel his emotions – and that Nimitz is now as hostile to White Haven as he himself is as a result. He has to remember that the man is technically his Steadholder's superior when they're both in uniform, and that as a result he has to tolerate his presence around her. For her to snub him without a demonstrable offence would be political and career suicide - at least on Manticore.

Still … he makes a note to set up another diversion for the next dinner, and a reminder to make sure that there were enough high ranking guests that neither of them were seated particularly close to each other. And another note to make sure that White Haven remains discretely monitored whilst on Grayson.

White Haven and he are not the only moths; there are others. Most just amuse him - and are totally harmless to her (he's intercepted one or two who aren't and sent rather _pointed_ messages to their home services' psych departments) - her gaggle of worshipful junior officers, spreading out across both fleets, reshaping both into something that he suspects (in the Grayson case at least) will be unrecognisable to the officers who came before her (it's possible given enough time, she will have the same effect on Manticore too, but their traditions, at least in these terms are more entrenched).

He is concerned by the fact he has seen the hunger for her fire in the eyes of some of the men - and women - on the other side of the battlefield as well, because of what the consequences for her will be if one of them captures her. It is, of course possible that he will end up losing her to one of them at the end of this; that she will be the Bride sacrificed by both her monarchs to keep the Peace (it would make a rather fitting addition to some of the mythology that's starting to grow up around her); not that he expects Benjamin or Elizabeth to do it deliberately, but it would solve so many of their problems - and not just that of the war, but of finding someone for his Steadholder herself.


End file.
